Sorry for my rambliness, but this is something that's been bugging me for the duration of my training. With any luck, my increase in rank should mean I don't have to train with him as often, but it is almost unavoidable in many cases. Has anyone else experienced this problem? How do you deal with an unwilling training partner? Should I speak with the instructor about this, or accept that little Billy has different capabilities/ambitions than myself and soldier on?
/Erik

Throw him hard until he leaves, or decides to become better at what he's doing.

While I haven't directly said anything about his lack of enthusiasm to him, I do my utmost to not let it ruin my training. I basically go full-speed (to the same extent that I do with anyone else in the club), he occasionally complains and tells me to "take it easy" when I don't just go limp when he does the technique wrong, and all in all I suspect my feeling of apprehension when we're paired up is mutual.

Like I mentioned, when we're rolling, it's next to impossible to get him to do anything, he mostly just sits there until you submit him. People in the club have different approaches to dealing with his inactivity; the more pedagogic blue-belts will try to teach him some submissions, assuming that his inaction stems from not knowing what to do; some people will just give him positions and literally *beg* him to submit them; as I mentioned, I try to go as all-out as I can, hoping that he'll be compelled to stop my 543rd Kimura from guard, with mixed results (he sometimes stuffs one submission, but gives up when I transition to another).

I'll consider having a talk with him if (when) this becomes an issue again. As stated, though, being that we no longer share rank, I'm hopeful that I'll spend less time with him.

While I haven't directly said anything about his lack of enthusiasm to him, I do my utmost to not let it ruin my training. I basically go full-speed (to the same extent that I do with anyone else in the club), he occasionally complains and tells me to "take it easy" when I don't just go limp when he does the technique wrong, and all in all I suspect my feeling of apprehension when we're paired up is mutual.

Like I mentioned, when we're rolling, it's next to impossible to get him to do anything, he mostly just sits there until you submit him. People in the club have different approaches to dealing with his inactivity; the more pedagogic blue-belts will try to teach him some submissions, assuming that his inaction stems from not knowing what to do; some people will just give him positions and literally *beg* him to submit them; as I mentioned, I try to go as all-out as I can, hoping that he'll be compelled to stop my 543rd Kimura from guard, with mixed results (he sometimes stuffs one submission, but gives up when I transition to another).

I'll consider having a talk with him if (when) this becomes an issue again. As stated, though, being that we no longer share rank, I'm hopeful that I'll spend less time with him.

/Erik

I guess I need to spell out my last post a bit because some people are too dumb and literal (not you Hadzu) to understand what I wrote.

You get better at judo by NOT "pulling punches". You are too worried about what's going on in this kid's head. Don't be one of the people giving him position on purpose...that will only hurt YOUR judo.

Throw him hard (nobody said hurt the kid..) That is good judo. Submit him right. That is good judo. Kimura him to a 1000 times and keep going. That is how YOU get better. It sounds based on your post like that's what you're doing already, so just stay on that path.

If he wants better judo, he'll learn to do it better. If he doesn't want better judo he will quit.

If you go easy on him, you both lose. Based on your last post, it sounds like this person is affecting the training of several other people. Don't become one of them...your training time with him will be finite. Just don't waste any of it worrying about his motivation.

@ W. Rabbit: While I'm sorry to admit that I don't practice Judo (though our system of JJJ feels more reminiscent of Judo than of other JJJ in my limited experience), it's solid advice nonetheless, and I'll endeavor to follow both your advice as well as that of many others on this thread.

@ Eddie Hardon: That's inspirational, man; our club places great emphasis on including people, regardless of age (barring some extremes), gender, disabilities, or any other exterior conditions. It's very motivational to hear of people that work through these seemingly unconquerable challenges and I agree that if there's a will, there's a way (the problem with Billy being, of course, that he currently isn't very motivated). Thanks for the uplifting story, man.

@Doofaloofa: While I understand your concern, and in no way condemn you for keeping them, let me assure you that there is no risk of me going balls-to-the-walls on Billy and hurting the guy; I'm sure my young age makes it easy, expected even, to assume that I lack much of the reasoning capabilities of an adult. I do, no doubt, but I'm not about to throw people through walls, so don't worry man =).

I would never instruct a beginner to throw hard. It certainly is not appropriate to throw everyone with the same level of force regardless of their ability. Asking one beginner to throw another one hard is asking for trouble, especially if uke is awkward, scared and unskilled. What is required is sufficient force to complete the technique cleanly, which varies from throw to throw. "Hard" is a word which is wide-open to misinterpretation, especially by beginners. Which both of these kids are, if I've not made myself clear.

This seems to be becoming strangely hostile rather quickly. I think I may have overstated the prevalence of throws in the curriculum, they really aren't very present at our belt levels (although we do, of course, practice things not directly tied to our belt ranks from time to time). In general, and especially at the lower belt grades, joint locks are much more prevalent (a number of which are variations on Aikido techniques, only less big-circley and flashy); I suppose the idea of not letting him *have* a technique just because he's too lazy to do it still applies, though.

While I'm happy to be getting so much feedback, this talk of us "kids" throwing eachother, in one way or another, are neither here nor there and not very essential to the discussion. I know my young age makes it easy to equate me to a child, and while I'm sure I lack much of the wisdom I'll gain later in life, I *do* actually have the judgement necessary to not go full-force on people out of frustration.

Obviously, do your best not to work with the guy whenever you can, but it sounds like you're already doing that.

When I get paired with shitty partners, I usually go into it resolved to work on one particular thing. Maybe it's trying to maintain my posture while I move, maybe it's keeping myself protected from any possible strike (even one my partner isn't going to bother to throw), whatever. If I'm stuck with a partner who won't challenge me, it's up to me to challenge myself.

Welcome to Bullshido. I know it's taken a bit of a tangent but I didn't want bad advice to just sit there unchallenged.

I know my young age makes it easy to equate me to a child, and while I'm sure I lack much of the wisdom I'll gain later in life, I *do* actually have the judgement necessary to not go full-force on people out of frustration.

You're 16, you are a kid, albeit a well-spoken one. My own kids are 18 and 20 and both sound quite rational - doesn't stop them from making similar dumb decisions that I made at their age. It's not a pejorative, its just where you are in life. But that's a side-bar: W.Rabbit's advice is likely to end badly for adults, too.

Anyways, to extend the tangent to your own situation - in groundwork you can choose to work a technique hard and fast or back off on it. It is not always appropriate to go hard. Doing so with this particular uke would be useless. Probably the best you can get out of it is to try to make each technique as perfect as you can. If you are using force to complete something, evaluate if that is necessary or if you could do it better with less force. So my advice is exactly opposite of W.Rabbit's.

@Owlmatt: Solid advice, man! I do try to do this to a certain extent (e.g when rolling with the guy I tend to think "So, how many different ground submissions do I know / how many can I pull off in the allotted time?", though perhaps it'd be good to get more creative. I'll definitely keep that in mind.

@Doofaloofa: None taken, mate, I just get kinda prickly at being thought less of because of my age, but of course that's perfectly reasonable in this case and seems more to do with my lack of experience in MA rather than my physical age. It's all cool, in any case.

@NeilG: Yeah, I understand that I'm probably coming off as a little whiny to you guys; I'm sure that no matter how mature/intelligent/"grown up" I might consider myself now, I'll look back in ten years and see how much growing I had done since then.

Being that two (in my eyes) very respectable people are telling me to do opposite things, I'm at a bit of a loss. My thoughts so far are: Avoid training with him when possible, when I get paired up with him I'll be polite, helpful (not that I don't strive to be with all my training partners), I'll do my techniques correctly but not try to power through anything, I'll be patient with him, basically. If the problem persists, I'll talk to him about it and ask him what's up, but if it's at all manageable it's live and let live.
Does this sound like a good plan?